Hampden Charter School of Science (in Chicopee) and Pioneer Charter School of Science (in Everett) are publicly-funded charter schools in Massachusetts. An earlier charter school planned in 2006, College Preparatory Charter School of Springfield, never materialized. As this 2007 news article notes, the group that tried to found College Preparatory Charter School of Springfield applied again a year later to start the Hampden school.

Pioneer Charter School of Science was mentioned in Greg Toppo's USA Today article of Aug 17, 2010 entitled "Objectives of charter schools with Turkish ties questioned."INSIDER DEALS: Gulen charter schools contract to Gulenist companies for various goods and services. In July 2011, a building permit (see screenshot below from businesswest.com website) was issued to the Gulenist corporation Ace It Education, Inc.to perform a $35000 renovation of classrooms at Hampden Charter School of Science. This is surprising, given that in the charter application for Pioneer Charter School of Science, it is stated that "Nurcan Civelek is currently director and teacher at the ACE-IT Education Center, a non-profit tutoring and home-schooling center for K-12." An IRS Bulletin from 2005 announced that Ace It Education had failed to maintain its 501(c)3 nonprofit status, yet it continues to file IRS 990 forms, indicating its status may have been reinstated. How it manages to be in both the tutoring and the construction business is unclear.

Records of the Corporations Division of the state of Massachusetts show that Ace It Education, Inc. went through several name changes. In the past, it was named Friendship Foundation, Inc. and then Turkish Cultural Center Boston, Inc. An entity named Turkish Cultural Center Boston is a member organization of the Turkic American Alliance, the umbrella organization for the Gulen Movement in the US. The address 500 Revere St, Revere MA 02151 used by Ace It Education on some of its IRS Form 990s is an address also used by the Boston Dialogue Foundation, another Gulenist organization. Thus, the contract with Ace It Education illustrates how money flows from the charter schools to the Gulen Movement.

Further evidence of Ace It Education performing construction work for Hampden Charter School of Science is shown by the following, which also clearly shows the website of Ace It Education as turkishcenterboston.org:

Crossing the line of church-state separation for publicly-funded schoolsThe Perimeter Primate/Charter School Scandals blogger found the following information about Ace It Education in a 2007 piece on the muslimmedianetwork.com website: "The students, who come from Revere and other nearby cities, are part of a homeschooling organization called Ace It Education. The organization offers first through fifth grade. The students learn Qur’an, Arabic, and Islamic studies in addition to regular school subjects. They meet Monday through Friday for six hours a day at the Boston Dialogue Foundation and are taught by a staff of five full and part-time teachers. Ace It Education functions like a full-time Islamic school, but for various logistical reasons, such as lack of space and the difficulty of complying with Massachusetts school regulations, the organization has chosen to keep its homeschooling status, at least for another year."

Transfer of Hampden property from Ace It Education to Johnson Road PropertiesIn January 2013, Ace It Education sold the property at 20 Johnson Road, Chicopee MA, which is the site of Hampden Charter School, to another Gulenist corporation named Johnson Road Properties, Inc. Corporate officers include Melih Yildirim, Mesut Sahin (misspelled Mesut Sabin) and Faruk Apaydin (misspelled Paruk Apaydim).

More evidence of the Gulen connection:Hampden and Pioneer share characteristics with other schools in the nationwide chain of Gulen charter schools:

The 2010-11 Hampden student handbook letter is identical to the one used by many other Gulen charter schools.

The text string “instills in our students values such as accountability, compassion, integrity, tolerance and leadership” used in Hampden's application is also used by the Harmony Public Schools chain in Texas, and Discovery School in Tulsa, Oklahoma (Gulen charter schools).

Hampden is mentioned on one of Gulen's websites in connection with a student winning second place in the folklore category at the Turkish Language Olympiads (Gulenist competition). http://tr.fgulen.com/content/view/18312/11/Hampden's participation in Turkish Olympiads is also mentioned in a Cihan News article. Cihan is a Gulenist news agency.

Additional connections to the Gulen Movement and the nationwide network of Gulen charter schools are shown by the multiple affiliations, both past and present, of the following individuals:

Aziz Aghayev, a.k.a. Aziz Agayev

Pioneer Charter School of Science

Hampden Charter School of Science

Business Representative, Truebright Science Academy (Gulen charter school in PA)

Author of articles in Fountain Magazine (Gulenist publication; Fethullah Gulen writes lead article for each issue)

Guest Speaker, Accord Institute for Education Research AMSP camp (these camps are typically attended by students from Gulen charter schools in CA, NV, AZ and UT; Accord is a Gulenist corporation that contracts to these schools)

Nihat Guvercin

Author of application form for Hampden Charter School of Science

Passaic Arts and Science Charter School (Gulen charter school in NJ)

Harmony Science Academy Dallas (Gulen charter school in TX)

Cosmos Foundation (Gulenist organization)

Soner Gokbulut

Science teacher, Hampden Charter School of Science

Teacher, Pioneer Academy of Science (private Gulen school in NJ)

Truebright Science Academy Charter School (Gulen charter school in PA)

In thesis, mentions Zafer Sahinoglu (TCC Western Mass); Kadir A. Peker (Founding board member of Pioneer Charter School of Science), Recep Senturk (Journal of Economic and Social Studies, now at Fatih University), Erhan Yilmaz (would-be founder of Richmond Science Academy) as friends. The listed affiliations of all these individuals are Gulenist.

Signer of loan forgiveness letter to Fulton Science Academy (Gulen charter school in Georgia). Letterhead said "Sema Education and Health Development Co. Inc.; this Gulenist corporation shares/d an address and phone number with the Turkish Cultural Center New York (prominent Gulenist organization)